If I’m lucky, it will reach the part of him that used to understand right from wrong and keep him from killing me. If I’m really lucky, it will distract him enough to give me a chance to escape.
“Quinn is still alive.” His voice is cold. “But then I suppose you knew that. Considering the damage he’s done over the past week, he must’ve arrived in the city the same day we did. Won’t take us long to corner him, now that we know who we’re looking for.”
“What damage?”
“Someone burned down the armory last night. We lost hundreds of weapons.” He speaks without much inflection, like the effort it takes to breathe life into his words is beyond him now. “Before that, it was my father’s lab. Before that, one of the army barracks. Yesterday, he got careless and was spotted just before a fire started in the trackers’ main training center. Longish dark hair, leather pants, looks like he belongs in a tree. It’s Quinn.”
I blink. Burning down armories and barracks and labs doesn’t sound like Quinn. Either he’s using the blazes as a distraction while he hunts for me, or he’s decided to start taking Rowansmark apart from the inside out without me. Or both.
“I bet you think he’s helping your cause, don’t you?” Ian asks, stepping closer to me. Marcus stops humming abruptly, and I hear the swish-scrape of his pants against the stone as he crawls toward the wall again. “I bet you think you’re going to be rescued, and that you’re going to turn the tables against a city-state—against an army of three city-states—and against the tanniyn, because if nothing else, you are recklessly confident in your own abilities.”
“And I bet you think you’re here to kill me, but you aren’t.” I speak softly, trying to keep Marcus from overhearing.
Ian laughs, but there’s no humor in it. Instead, he sounds impossibly tired. “We heard from Lankenshire. Logan isn’t coming. He went north instead, and now you’re of no use to us. I have to finish this. I have to restore my family’s honor. You can’t talk me out of this, Rachel. Don’t even try.”
“Maybe I can’t talk you out of taking another life, but I know someone who can.”
Ian swallows hard, and something that looks like regret flashes briefly in his eyes before the light inside of them winks out, replaced by dull purpose. “Samuel already tried, but he isn’t my leader. He isn’t the one who can restore my father’s name.” He draws his sword and steps closer. “I want you to know that even though I think you deserve this, it won’t bring me any pleasure.”
“James Rowan is a liar,” I say, holding Ian’s gaze while behind me, Marcus whispers Julia’s name over and over again. “He’s a liar who made you do his dirty work. Who convinced you that getting blood on your hands was somehow justice, when really it was a way to destroy the Commander’s people so he could become the unrivaled leader of the city-states.”
He shakes his head sharply, his eyes glowing pits of misery. “Justice requires—”
“Sacrifice. I know. But who was really sacrificed here? The only person who did anything wrong was the Commander, when he stole Logan and blackmailed your father. Every person after that has been an innocent caught up in circumstances beyond their control. Including you and me.”
I move closer to him. He tightens his stance as if I’m going to attack him, but I keep my hands down at my sides and say quietly, “Tell me, Ian, would you have killed anyone if your father had survived his pain atonement?”
“Don’t you dare speak of my father to me.” His chest heaves as if he’s been running, and bright spots of color darken his cheeks. “I did what was just.” He raises his sword, his expression desperate. “I did what—”
“You did what James Rowan wanted you to do because he made you believe you’d lost everything. That you had nothing left except the faint hope that with enough Baalboden blood on your hands, your father’s death wouldn’t be in vain.”
“Stop talking about my father!” He lunges toward me.
“Ian!” I scream his name, and Marcus falls silent for a second as Ian aims his blade at my heart.
“Ian? Son. My son? Mine? Ian!” Marcus’s voice cuts through the space between Ian and me, a wavering knife of anguished hope.
Ian freezes, his sword hand shaking, and looks at the wall behind me. “Who is that? Who’s in there?”
“James Rowan lied to you.” I step to the side so that Ian can see his father’s bright-blue eye blinking through the crack in the wall. “Your father is still alive.”
UNCORRECTED E-PROOF–NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
..................................................................
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
RACHEL
Ian’s sword hits the stone floor of my cell with a clatter. He stands frozen in place, his mouth open, though no sound comes out.
“Ian? Mine? Ian?” Marcus sounds like he’s begging.
“That’s not . . . it’s not possible.” Ian’s voice shakes.
“Go to him,” I say. Go to him and leave your sword behind and the cell door wide open. Please.
“It’s not . . .” Ian lowers himself to the cell floor in unsteady increments. “It can’t be. I saw him fall. He didn’t get up. James pronounced him dead. I saw—”
“You saw what James Rowan wanted you to see so that you would be so ruined inside, you’d do anything he told you.” I take a tiny step back from him, but he doesn’t notice. He’s staring at the strips of scar tissue covering what used to be Marcus’s nose.
“Ian? Please? Ian?” Marcus presses his face against the wall, his gaze locked on his son.
Ian’s fists clench, and he leans closer to the crack, his entire body trembling. “Dad?” His voice breaks, and he reaches one hand toward the wall.
“Ian. Ian? Mine.” Marcus sounds buoyant and upbeat for the first time since I’ve been listening to him speak. “Good. My son. Good boy. Good.”
Ian’s chest heaves as he presses his palm to the crack in the wall. A long wail of pent-up anguish rips its way past his lips, and he sobs while Marcus croons over and over that Ian, his son, is good.
“No, Dad.” Ian sounds desperate. “I’m not good. I’ve . . . done things. I hurt you. And then James sent me to Baalboden to deliver a message of pain atonement to the Commander and his people, and I did it. I . . .” He lays his head on the dungeon floor and cries.
I bend down and try to pick up Ian’s sword. The weight of it sends stabs of white-hot pain through my back, and I drop the weapon. It hits the floor with a harsh clang, but Ian is too caught up to notice.
“Okay. Okay? Ian.” Marcus tries to reach his hand through the crack, but there’s only room for his fingers. “Okay, Ian.”
“It’s not okay!” Ian shouts. “It will never be okay. I’ve done terrible things in the name of justice, because you were dead, and it was all I had left, but it was a lie. Everything was a lie.”
Ian has a dagger. I see the hilt peeking out of the boot closest to me. I may not be able to pick up his sword, but I can handle a dagger. I move swiftly, closing the short distance between us and ignoring the painful sting of scabs pulling against healthy skin as I crouch down and reach for the dagger.
“Forgive. Ian? Forgive you? All gone. All.” Marcus’s voice is gentle. “Forgive all, Ian.”
A sudden flash of anger burns through me as I pull the dagger from its sheath and get to my feet. Why does Ian get the happy ending? Why is his father alive and ready to offer absolute forgiveness, while mine is dead, and I’m left alone to deal with the things I’ve done? I want to rail against the unfairness of it. I want to be the one lying on the floor, crying over my guilt and my grief, and hearing my father say that it’s okay.
“I don’t deserve forgiveness,” Ian says, his face pressed to the floor like he can’t bear to look into his father’s eyes.
“No, you don’t.” My voice is brittle, and I hold the dagger steady in my left hand while I back away from Ian.
He lifts his face and looks at me. Where moments ago
there had been nothing but dull purpose to fill the emptiness in his gaze, regret and anguish war with hope in his eyes. I look away.
“Forgive? Forgive,” Marcus says, like all I need to be able to join him in his ability to instantly embrace the son who turned against him is a reminder of what I’d have to be able to do.
I look back at Ian, who stares at me in silence, his expression haunted. I’m struck by the fact that the guilt and horror I see on his face are similar to what lived inside my silence until Quinn helped me unlock it. Similar, but not the same. I made choices that hurt others, but I didn’t knowingly hurt them. I didn’t set out with the intention to take hundreds of lives.
My unshakable quest for vengeance never cost others what Ian’s has cost me. Does that make me better than him?
“I thought he was dead,” Ian whispers.
I take another step toward the open cell door. Outside, a trumpet blows, and the earthshaking sound of hundreds of soldiers marching in unison fills the air. I can’t get out of the mansion unseen when three separate armies all seem to be running drills on the grounds at the same time. I don’t even know if I can get out of the dungeon unseen. Who knows how many staff members and guards are lurking in the house?
“Your father is a good man. I’ve spent days listening to him ramble on about his family. That’s all that matters to him. That’s all that ever drove anything he did.” I tuck the dagger behind me, but Ian doesn’t seem to notice. “What drove you, Ian?”
“Rachel . . .” Ian looks lost as I back away.
“Ian. Mine? Forgive all. Ian?” Marcus pushes his fingers through the crack as far as they can go, and Ian slowly reaches out and lays his hand over his father’s fingers.
“My dad is dead. For real.” My voice shakes a little. “I know what that’s like. It was bad, and I wasn’t the one who killed him. But I found out about his death right after seeing the Commander murder Oliver, my grandfather, because the Commander was sure that if he broke me, I’d do what he wanted. So I know, Ian.” I back up a little more and bump into the open cell door. “I know loss and anger and the desperate need to avenge yourself against those who wronged you because you think that will somehow make it easier to get through another day.”
“I thought he was dead. I thought . . .”
“Okay, Ian. Rachel? Okay?” Marcus sounds worried.
I force myself to let the anger drain out of my voice. “We’re okay, Marcus. We’re just talking. Don’t worry about it.”
“Okay, Logan? Mine? Logan?”
I meet Ian’s eyes and say, “Not yet. But he will be. Won’t he, Ian?”
Ian stares at me and then at the crack in the wall where Marcus is babbling, “Inverse. Summoners? Below! Ian inverse? Transmitter wave? Below? Ian!”
“I don’t understand. . . .” Ian looks from me to his father and back again. “I don’t understand what he’s saying.”
I grip the dagger so hard, the handle bites into my palm. “You have to understand. You have to figure it out. Marcus said you knew how to destroy the summoners.”
“He doesn’t seem to be saying much of anything at all,” Ian says quietly.
“He says enough.” I step into the open doorway. “You just have to learn how to decode it.”
“Decode?” Ian stares at his father as if trying to figure out where things have gone wrong inside Marcus’s mind.
“That’s all that’s left of him now. James Rowan saw to that, and to a lesser extent, so did you, though Marcus doesn’t blame you. You were just being a loyal citizen, after all. Isn’t that the line Rowan fed you? Restoring honor by helping to destroy your father?”
Ian remains silent, but I find I still have plenty to say.
“Whatever his mind was before he was nearly whipped to death and tossed into the dungeon for months with nothing but the ghosts of his family to keep him company, it’s gone. The scientific genius, the grand inventor, the man who could occupy one of the highest positions in Rowansmark’s government, is gone. But you’re lucky, Ian, because the best of your father remains. He has nothing left but love and devotion for his sons. If you listen carefully, you’ll learn to figure out the things he can’t quite say, but you don’t have to listen carefully to hear that he loves you and forgives you. If you don’t protect that, if you don’t get him out of here and become worthy of the gift he’s given you, then you are spitting his love back at his feet.”
“How can he forgive me after all I’ve done?” Ian’s voice is rough and pleading. Marcus’s fingers tighten around his son’s, and he croons softly through the wall.
“He doesn’t know. And somehow I think even if he did know, he’d still choose to love you.” I step into the hall and walk to Marcus’s door, since Ian shows no signs of getting up off the cell floor. The chain running through Marcus’s lock is heavier than it looks, and I suck in a pained breath as I carefully slide the dagger inside my boot and then struggle to remove the chain.
“Why didn’t you tell him?” Ian says behind me.
I stop pulling on the chain and look at him. “Because he’s been through enough. He loves you. He thinks the world of you. He doesn’t deserve to have that ripped away from him.”
“I don’t know what to say.” He sounds confused as he takes the chain from me and begins unwrapping it.
He’s not the only one. I want to punch him in the face. I want to break down and cry because it isn’t my dad behind this door. I want to stop feeling empathy for the boy who killed my best friend.
“I don’t want to hear anything you have to say.” I step back as the door swings open. “I just want you to help me save Logan.”
“Jared Adams’s Rachel? My sons? Save? Promised,” Marcus says. “Promised. Inverse.”
“You promised him we’d save Logan?” Ian doesn’t sound happy.
I turn toward him and snap, “No, I promised him I’d save you both from James.”
“Why would you want to save me?”
“I don’t. But it was the price of getting him to tell me about the summoners. Marcus says you know how to destroy them. We have to do that before Logan gets here.”
“You forget that Logan went north. With the Commander, apparently. He isn’t coming.”
I meet his gaze. “He’s coming. I promise you. If he went north first, he had a good reason, but he’s coming to get me, and we are going to destroy the summoners before he gets here.”
Ian steps into his father’s cell, but keeps his eyes on me. “I don’t know where they are or how to—”
“Inverse! Summoners below inverse transmitter music? Wave function! Ian? Ian!” Marcus shuffles toward us, his back permanently hunched, his gait unsteady. I’m guessing he didn’t have medical care after his whipping.
“What is he saying?” Ian demands.
“He’s saying you know how to destroy the summoners. Something about inverse.” I move away from the cell, though I don’t yet know how I’m getting out of here. “Just tell me, and I’ll figure out where they are. I’ll search the entire city if I have to. Just—”
“I don’t know!” Ian shouts. “I don’t know what he’s saying or where the summoners are, and I don’t know if I should help you even if I could.”
“Ian!” Marcus’s voice is wounded. “Help? Help Logan? Help.”
“Yes, Ian, help.” My lips curl around the words, though for Marcus’s sake, I try to keep my tone even. “Help your brother. You owe him that. You owe us both.”
“Inverse! Transmitter? Ian?”
“I don’t speak tech. What is he saying?” I ask as I glance at the dungeon’s window. The bars gleam dully in the morning light, and I can just make out the lines of soldiers parading across the grounds. Soldiers in Rowansmark green and brown. But also soldiers in gray and blue. Soldiers in dark blue and white. A combined army that is so much bigger than anything Logan and Lankenshire can pull together.
Not that the army will matter if Rowan’s summoners call a host of tanniyn instead.
<
br /> “Summoners? Logan? Inverse? Wave!” Marcus stumbles, and Ian rushes to his side. The moment Ian touches his father, Marcus turns and wraps his arms around his son, holding him tight while he croons Julia’s broken melody and smiles.
“Inverse . . . wave? Is that what you mean?” Ian looks at me. “It could work. Using a sonic wave that’s the inverse of the frequency emitted by the summoners would, in theory, negate their signal.”
“Would you need to know the exact location of the summoners to use an inverse sonic wave?”
“No, sound travels. The wave is amplified using transmitters, so theoretically, as long as you were in the vicinity and had a stronger sound wave, you could nullify the signal.” He slowly leans his cheek against his father’s shoulder, as if worried the resting place he seeks will disappear as soon as he gets there.
“So all we need to do is build a device that can send an inverse of the summoners’ signal, right? You can do that, can’t you, Ian?” My voice is a hard slap.
“I can’t.” His blue eyes challenge mine. “Remember how I said that Quinn burned down the lab? Years of research, equipment, supplies, and proprietary tech . . . gone.”
Up until a few moments ago, I’d have been overjoyed to learn that the lab was destroyed. I’d planned to do it myself. Now, I’m terrified that the destruction of the lab means there’s nothing I can do to save Logan.
“What can we do?” I ask. Fear trembles through my voice.
“Logan? Save? Promised. Mine. Logan?” Marcus pulls back to look at Ian.
Ian looks at the floor. “We don’t know where the summoners are buried, and we don’t have the supplies to build another controller. We can’t stop this.”
I stare at him, my chest burning, my eyes stinging, and feel something powerful surge through me. Maybe Ian can’t stop it. Maybe he’s willing to look at all the obstacles standing in our way and admit defeat. Or maybe he just has no intention of trying to save Logan after spending so many months hating him.
I don’t care. I’m not giving up. If I can’t save Logan from inside Rowansmark, then I’ll just have to escape into the Wasteland and stop him from ever arriving at Rowansmark in the first place.
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